memories

Some realisations wait in the wings; quietly murmuring their lines until some mysterious stage hand points towards the lights. An aroused audience of one bristles as our player stumbles across the boards. Flowering at last, a bloom of gestures and revelatory dialogue which can tranquilize or incinerate with a pyroclastic fervour.

Its been quite some time since I’ve posted on this site. Sat down and tried to fulfil the promise and purpose of this little domain which I long ago intended to discuss the aspects of, and issues around, “my illness.” A nebulous term which draws its authority from a peculiar and potentially dangerous branch of pseudo-science. Considering bipolarity a disorder has never helped me. Lithium reigned me in, though I cannot say that there isn’t an alternative method for equalising my moods. To my great shame a vein of cowardice – or worse apathy – makes it unlikely that I’ll ever seek one out.

Epilepsy has given me a metric by which to measure the pathology of my psyche. Epilepsy is quantifiable. EEGs can demonstrate wiring faults as effectively as any halfway competent electrician. The MRI sketches poured over and waved triumphantly above the heads of psychopharmacologists appear to suffer from an a certain object impermanence. Traction subsides, and the diagnoses and treatment plans of every mental health professional I’ve ever encountered comes from defaulting to a sort of conventional wisdom; perhaps characterised by instincts which would be familiar to Witchfinders General.

The last 36 words aren’t necessarily dismissive. Perception is everything after all. If you treat bipolarity as an illness – if that helps keep you as healthy and happy as can be – then that is the reality as it applies to you. My experiences (within and without mental “illness”) have instilled a Ballardian appreciation of unreality and dominant fictions of the world around me. The recalibration of my mind and moods comes from repeat attempts to calculate and reconcile the contradictions and inverted logic of the suspicious and deliciously perverted “real”.

From here on in, my thoughts and attempts to make my way through this world, will hopefully hinge upon a more conscious appreciation of these dim repressions. The human body is a mechanical wonder driven by powerful and adaptive OSs. To drive the mechanism onwards, to maintain its inward integrity whilst engaging with competitive systems, requires flexibility and mutation. Consciousness, the imagination, the psyche: all crucial constructs which can neither function nor exist within fixated boundaries.

The query has become: how do I function? The query has become: why do I function? The query has become: how and why don’t we function the same?

I won’t call it an epiphany. Lightbulbs can’t take this long to come on. Call it a lingering, teasing subconscious knowing.

Ask me about my earliest memories and all I can summon up are impressions. Emotions, colours, oblique images of sunlight and green leaves and running running running. Imagination is a good word. In my head. Always in my mind.

My earliest cohesive memory is of the day my father left home. Chasing after him as he charged through the front door. Mum and dad had spent what felt like days in their room. I walked in at one point and was immediately turned out again. Memories are unreliable at the best of times. This is what I recall.

Divorcing couples is mundane. The significance of this event has less to do with the details and the drama. For me, it was the moment I had to confront a world outside of myself.

I worshipped my father. He was funny, kind, knowledgable, creative. Over the years I resented my mother because she dealt in what’s practical, what’s necessary; while it was all magic with him. Over time I matured and became wise to the wonder in her too, as well as appreciating the sacrifices and true value of everything she had done for me and my brother. I can’t say I ever hated my father. I resented what followed in his wake.

Calling it “The Damage” may be a little extreme. My comic strip mentality wants to call it an “activation event” – a shock preceding a critical change. Looking back I consider that my whole life has been about the fissure between my outer and inner worlds: again a fairly mundane struggle, but more overt in people “like us”.

The other night I was casually regarding my toes. Picturing what my feet would look like with certain ones cut off. Considering the permutations and how my walking would be affected. I haven’t cut myself in nearly ten years but I think about it every day. When I wake up and before I go to sleep. My right arm, which took the brunt of all the Red back in the day, feels heavy. Sometimes like lead; and I just leave it hanging it at my side as I walk

Is there any worth in writing a suicide note, even if you have no cause or intention to follow up on its promise? Should it be something everyone does – setting out the reasons you want or need it to stop, in the hope that you’re heading off trouble ahead of time? Sign offs have never appealed to me, because you can never cover everything and honestly why would you leave that behind? Something tangible, crafted in your misery, tainting the fingertips of those you’ve left behind.

I won’t call it an epiphany, because deep down I’ve always known. I’m waiting for it to stop. That it’ll end “before my time” seems inevitable to me. I cannot cross the divide – I’m still that little boy caught between two worlds, and the bleed is too much to take on sometimes. I have to be this way because all bases must be covered.